


dream a little dream of me

by ArgentLives



Series: Across Every Universe (You are Home) [10]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: F/M, Implied Sexual Content, Non-Graphic Smut, Sexual Frustration, Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-19
Updated: 2015-09-19
Packaged: 2018-04-21 10:59:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4826594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArgentLives/pseuds/ArgentLives
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Barry dreams about Iris. A lot. Late at night, alone in bed, in ways he's not entirely proud of, but hey. No one has to know.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dream a little dream of me

**Author's Note:**

> written for the prompt: "How about a dream sequence with Barry dreaming about Iris and the dream is so intense he avoids her for a week. He can't even look at her with out blushing, when she touches him he flinches and runs a way, etc."; smut is not my forte so here's something vaguely like it?

The first time Barry dreams about Iris, like  _really_  dreams of her—bare skin and bright eyes, the curve of her hips, the rise of her chest, the shape of her legs, the softness of her hands, the arches of her feet and the fullness of her lips, all the things about her that he sees every day and has committed to memory and all the things he doesn’t see but thinks about far more often than he probably should, every last detail of her from the hair on her head to the tips of her toes—she’s sleeping two doors down from him, with only the bathroom they share in between.

One minute he’s trying hard to fall asleep, trying not to think about earlier, about how he’d been in the hallway and about to turn into his room when she’d emerged from the bathroom, the towel that had been wrapped tight around her body getting caught on the door handle. It had fallen to the ground, slipped off and pooled around her bare feet, and for one brief, horrifying moment as she’d turned to pick it up she’d locked eyes with him before he’d even had time to turn away or close his eyes. She’d screamed and then he’d screamed and she’d frantically picked the towel up and made a mad dash to her room, and he’d thrown a hand up over his face and squeezed his eyes shut and walked into the wall at least twice before finally tripping and stumbling his way into his. 

It’s not exactly an easy thing notto think about.

He doesn’t know when it happens, when he finally drifts off into sleep, trying so hard  _not_  to think about her and yet the thought of her still undoubtedly on his mind, of her bare chest and of the water clinging to her skin and dripping down her thighs, but at some point he does. And then the next thing he knows, he’s opening his eyes and blinking away the sleepiness clouding his vision and propping himself up on his elbow, and there she is, standing in his doorway, silhouetted by the soft glow of the moonlight filtering through his window, and it’s really only fitting, he thinks, that the way it frames her body makes her look like some sort of angel.

“Barry,” she says, voice lifting a little at the end, almost as though it’s a question. His throat is dry and his tongue is tied and she looks so beautiful he can’t find it in him to do anything but watch as she makes her way over to his bed, hips swaying with easy confidence, her movements strong and steady and sure, like a force of nature that has him so utterly enticed he can’t move, can’t blink, can’t think. And then she climbs under the covers with him, pulling him down so that he’s laying on his side again and facing her. 

At first, he thinks it’s just going to be like how it used to, when she’d tiptoe into his room and climb into his bed and scootch up close to comfort him after he’d wake up screaming and shaking from whatever nightmares the aftermath of his mother’s death could throw at him. Like she’ll just wrap her arms around him and bring him close and hold him there, safe and steady and secure and completely innocent, until he drifts off to sleep.

That’s not what happens at all.

“Barry,” she says again, except this time it’s spoken in a whisper, raw and tender and murmured softly against his lips, almost like it’s a secret meant to be kept with just the two of them. His responding “Iris” comes out as a gasp as she captures his lips with her own, pressing herself against him with only the thin silk material of her nightgown and his pajama pants in between them. He blinks, and suddenly there’s nothing there at all, no silk cloth or pajama pants or cotton boxers, and they’re facing each other completely exposed, bare skin to bare skin. 

She slides a leg in between his and rolls him over with her so that he’s on his back and she’s lying right on top of him, kissing him hungrily and then pulling away to nip at his bottom lip. He feels his heart beat louder, faster, as she dips her head to suck at the sensitive areas on his neck, lips brushing against his skin and then mouth settling over a spattering of freckles here and there to leave marks of her own, her smooth, naked skin warm against his own and leaving his mind in a haze of pleasure.

Hands, soft and gentle, firm and sure, start to wander, lower and lower, slow and teasing, fingers tracing patterns from his chest to his stomach to his hipbones and lower still, tracing the distance in between moles and freckles like she’s playing some maddening game of connect-the-dots, and then all of a sudden her hand grips and strokes and his eyes fly open with the thrill of it, from the shock and the pleasure and—he blinks, shaking his head to clear it of his Iris-induced daze, and as everything comes into focus he realizes that he’s not staring up at her face like he expects but at the plain white ceiling of his bedroom. The heavy but not unpleasant pressure is gone from on top of him, and he’s alone in his bed, sticky and sweaty and panting like he’s just run a marathon, the phantom touches from Iris’s careful fingers, her lips, her body, still clinging to his skin. 

“Fuck,” he whispers to himself as it dawns on him what’s just happened, as he slowly extracts himself from the tangled mess he’s made of his covers and swings his legs over the side of the bed. He’s all but trembling as he runs a shaky hand through his hair and groans at the unresolved ache in the pit of his stomach, the need still stirring inside him, the unresolved tension below the waistband of his boxers. 

 _Deep breaths, Barry,_ he tells himself, pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes until he sees stars, desperate to take his mind off of…off of  _that_. _One (inhale, exhale)—think of something else oh my God anything else, two (inhale, exhale)—giraffes sleep for only 20 minutes in any 24 hours and they never lie down, which is sad, poor giraffes, that’s gotta be tiring, but they can clean their own ears with their tongues, which is cool, so go giraffes, three (inhale, exhale)—it takes 8 minutes 17 seconds for light to travel from the Sun’s surface to the Earth, and light travels at a constant speed of 186,000 miles per second, I mean wow, imagine going that fast, four (inhale, exhale)—Ba is the symbol for the chemical element Barium, which coincidentally sounds kind of like Barry, ha ha, and has an atomic number of 56, five (inhale, exhale)—there are 60,000 miles of blood vessels in the human body, and there are 206 bones, except at birth, when it’s 270, and—_ _oh, fuck it._

He throws his head back in defeat and pushes himself off of the bed, tiptoeing out of his room and grabbing a towel from the towel closet before slipping into the bathroom, shutting the door as quietly as possible and praying with every fiber of his being that the sound of running water won’t wake up Joe, or worse, Iris (his mind gives a mental stutter over her name) because it’s the middle of the night and he honestly doesn’t want to have to explain himself, doesn’t know if he even  _could_ explain himself, or have to look either of them in the eye. He stands under the steady stream of water, letting his eyes flutter shut and letting the water wash away the sticky feeling on his legs, and this time he attends to himself, by himself. Despite all his efforts not to think about it, it’s the memory of the dream, of Iris’s lips and her skin and her hands and her touch, that does the trick.

She avoids him the next morning at breakfast, shuffling by him and refusing to make eye contact, and for one mortifying moment he’s afraid that somehow she just  _knows._ But then as they’re heading into school she grips his arm tight, leaning in to hiss in his ear, “Please, let’s just pretend that thing didn’t happen last night. That you didn’t see anything. God, I’m so embarrassed.”

He nods numbly, makes a poofing gesture in the air with his fingers and says, “There, it’s forgotten. Don’t worry about it, I barely even saw anything.” 

( _Yeah, right._ )

But it seems to make her relax, and she lets out a deep breath and then loops her arm with his like she usually does, absentmindedly bringing a hand up to his face. It takes everything in him not to flinch under her touch and yank his arm away because all he can think about is her  _hands_ , her fingers, and the memory of that stupid dream that just won’t go away, of her skin against his, hot and smooth and—

“Good, that’s what I was hoping,” she nods, patting his cheek, and then she smiles at him, and this time it’s him that’s avoiding eye-contact because how can he look her in eyes the after…after he dreamed that…she…ugh.

It’s going to be a very, very long day.

 

* * *

 

College is different. Maybe it’s the distance, maybe it’s the fact that dating opportunities, (or hookup opportunities), are a little more attainable now that he’s no longer a nerdy, awkward, puberty-ridden teenager. Okay, well, he’s definitely still nerdy and awkward, but now he’s grown into himself more and he’s reasonably attractive, enough so that people seem to find the whole “awkward” thing endearing instead of just embarrassing. 

There aren’t as many hopeless fantasies now that he has more real-life opportunities for relieving such tension, and he’s not as sexually frustrated as he was growing up down the hall from the girl (literally) of his dreams, and although he never really stops thinking of Iris and he definitely never stops loving her, that particular component of it is a little more bearable. At least, it is, until she tells him she’s coming up to his school for an overnight visit.

Originally, he has it all set up for her to stay in one of his female friend’s dorms, because of hall regulations and all (which, really, they could easily get around, but he doesn’t mention that for obvious reasons), except then he accidentally mentions that his roommate will be away for the weekend and she insists on finding a way to stay with him. 

“Oh, come on, why not, Barry?” she says over  the phone, excitement clear in her voice. “Live a little. You can smuggle me in to your dorm after hours, no one’s gonna notice. I’d rather stay with you than someone I’ve never met. I promise I won’t judge the mess.”

Like she assumes that’s the reason for her his reluctance. His room isn’t even  _that_ messy (okay, yes it is, but his roommate totally shares the blame for that), but he plays along anyway, grateful for the cover, and caves, predictably. He tells her fine, and then the day before she plans on coming he assures her that she can take his bed and he’ll take his roommate’s (he’s already cleared it with Paul, plus the dude owes him anyway), and wah-la, it should be fine.

Except that night, the night before she’s supposed to arrive, he finds himself suddenly, miserably stuck on the thought of  _her_ in  _his_  bed, sleeping right there, and even though they won’t actually be occupying it together it doesn’t stop his stupid mind from imagining it.

And God, does he imagine it. He dreams of Iris dropping her bags at the door and throwing her arms around him for a much-awaited embrace, but instead of their usual customary best-friend greeting (re: a silly little hand-shake they made up when they were ten and at least six more hugs to follow), she kisses him, or he kisses her, it doesn’t really matter, because then she’s asking which bed is his and she’s pulling him into it with her and he’s pulling her shirt over her head and she’s unbuttoning his and the rest…well. He’s really glad his roommate is away.

He gets up at the crack of dawn the next morning to take a nice, long shower, and wash his sheets just in case she decides to show up early, because he knows Iris has a tendency to do so when she’s excited, and that would be _really_  bad and ridiculously humiliating for a lot of reasons.

That night, after a day full of Iris-and-Barry and some much-needed catching up, he climbs into his roommate’s bed, exhausted, as she’s settling into his, snuggling under the covers and then turning on her side to face him from across the room. She pulls the covers up over her mouth and nose and laughs.

“Wow, Barry. You actually remembered to clean these this semester. I’m so proud.”

He grunts noncommittally, profoundly grateful for the fact that they’ve already turned the lights off because the darkness should hide the worst of his blush.

“I mean, they smell really good like…I don’t know, they smell like  _you_. It’s nice,” she mumbles sleepily, closing her eyes, and he manages a quiet  _‘uh, thanks?’_  his face burning in mortification, his palms sweaty, his heart thudding so loudly he’s afraid it will give him away. And then she’s already drifting off into sleep, her face calm and peaceful and beautiful as always, and he has turn to face the wall, his back toward her, because watching her sleep (watching her sleep _in his bed)_ is really just going to make matters worse. 

When Iris asks him why he looks so tired over breakfast at the campus cafe the next morning, he panics and nearly chokes on his drink, the hot coffee scalding his tongue, and tells her he couldn’t sleep because his roommate’s pillow was lumpy and uncomfortable. Which is mostly a lie, but not completely, and what’s one more to add to the list, anyway?

 

* * *

 

It’s something Cisco says that brings it on. He hasn’t had much time to think about simple pleasures in life other than eating (a lot) and sleeping (not as much as he wishes he could–running is exhausting, especially when it’s done at super-speed)—which aren’t really simple pleasures so much as they are things necessary to survive—since waking up from his coma. His life has been too busy and full of work and shenanigans with meta-humans and, well, saving people. Protecting the city. Being a hero. 

In a way, it serves as a nice distraction, and he supposes it’s worked for a while since he hasn’t really had time or energy to think about much else, but then Cisco just has to open his mouth, twirling the lollipop he’s just taken out of it between his thumb and his forefinger to ask Barry what it’s  _like_ , and details please, of how his powers affect his…performance (for science, of course). And then of course he can’t  _stop_ thinking about it, especially when he’s reminded that he hasn’t exactly had sex since…God, since college, probably. 

That night, he dreams of Iris.

They meet on a rooftop—her spot, his spot,  _their_ spot—and she’s standing with her back toward him, looking out at the city and the busy, bustling streets below. When he looks down at himself he realizes he’s still in his Flash suit, only the cowl is down, and when he walks up behind her and she turns to face him she smiles like he’s exactly who she expects to have been hiding behind that mask. 

“You’re late,” she says, making a tutting noise with her tongue, eyes twinkling mischievously and lips curling into a playful smirk. “Always late, Barry Allen. And you kept me  _waiting_.”

“I’ll make it up to you,” he says as she steps closer, closing the distance between them, and he buries his face in the crook of her neck, wraps his arms around her waist and pulls her against him as she brings a hand up to lay against his chest.

“It feels really fast,” she hums in content, her fingers resting close to his heart, as he peppers kisses up and down her neck, along her jawline, then finally on her lips, and back down again.

“Yeah, it does. I mean, it is,” he says, smiling against her skin as the idea hits him. “I think–well, let me show you something.”

And then he’s vibrating his fingers as he trails them down her chest, gentle and testing, gauging her reaction, and his smile widens when she gasps, saying his name as he vibrates his fingers lower, past her chest, past her stomach, past her hips, massaging the area around her thighs until she’s gasping for more, clutching at his hair, eyes dark and heavy and lidded with desire. 

He doesn’t question how or when they suddenly end up in a bed, still on the roof and listening to the cars speed by below, like it’s appeared out of thin air. He also doesn’t question how despite being fully clothed a moment ago, somehow they’re both curiously naked. Naked, except for Iris’s green lace panties, and the part of him that knows this isn’t real realizes that this is definitely deliberate. He happily and dutifully removes them with his teeth, taking his time dragging them down her legs, before proceeding with his new-found little trick. Except this time he goes in with his tongue, flicking it out to vibrate it experimentally and finding to his, and to her, satisfaction that he most definitely can. And so he puts it to good use. 

There’s nothing sweeter than hearing her say his name like that, with so much want, so much desire, so much need. Nothing better than hearing her  _moan_  his name. “ _Barry, Barry, Barry,_ ” and “ _Yes, yes, yes,_ ” like he’s being good to her, like he’s pleasing her, like he’s getting her off, and it’s even better than her wandering hands on his body or her wet mouth against his skin, it’s so much better getting to do this to her, for her.

Her back arches and her mouth opens but he never hears what comes out of it next, because then he wakes up, bolting upright in his bed. He runs a hand down his face, and then holds it out in front of him, grinning to himself as he starts to vibrate it before slipping it under the covers. He figures he’s got a lot to test out, hoping that with a little practice, maybe someday he can…if…if…someday…

(He is  _so_  not telling Cisco about any of this)

 

* * *

 

“Iris—wait,” he says, and she stills with her hand on the waistband of his boxers, her dress and his suit—an actual suit this time, not his crime-fighting one—already in a pile on the floor, long forgotten.

“Okay,” she says and rocks back, her legs folded beneath her and the heels of her feet digging into her thighs. She looks a little disappointed, but she gives him an understanding smile and squeezes his hand in reassurance. “Okay, that’s fine, if you’re not ready yet.” 

They’ve just gotten back from their fifth official date, and it’s strange, because even after wanting this for so, so long, now that they’re together and that there are no more secrets between them, now that they’ve been through everything under the sun together and have somehow come out of it even stronger, he’s found that he likes taking things slow. That he wants to savor each and every moment he has with her and not rush through anything, because everything else in his world is always moving so fast,  _too_  fast, and he already plans on spending the rest of his life with her, anyway.

Except he’s definitely ready for this. More than ready.

“No! No, that’s not what I meant, although I appreciate—yeah. No, it’s just…” he trails off, eyes traveling away from her face, his gaze raking up and down her body, taking her all in, drinking in every detail, every crease and curve and imperfection, and he can’t believe she’s actually sitting before him like this, and that somehow, somewhere down the line, this incredible woman before him decided that she loved him back.  _God, he’s so fucking lucky._ “You’re here.”

“I’m here,” she says with a laugh as Barry rubs a thumb over her bottom lip and traces traces her cheekbones with shaking fingers. He slides a hand a down her neck and lets his fingers glide along her collarbones and over her shoulders, running them gently up and down her arms, giving her goosebumps. 

“You’re really here,” he repeats, completely in awe of her, and then he’s kissing every inch of her bare skin, as though he expects her to disappear at any moment, to vanish like an illusion as soon as he wakes up from this dream. He kisses her lips, and she’s still there. He kisses her neck, and she’s still there. He kisses her breasts, her stomach, her arms, presses his lips to the back of her hand and then into her palm, and she’s still there. Solid and naked and beautiful and _real_. “This is really happening.”

Iris giggles and cups his face in her hands, guiding him back up to her eye-level to meet his wide-eyed gaze. “Yes, Barry, it is.”

This time she kisses him, slow and savory and just a little more demanding, and when she breaks the kiss he rests his forehead against hers and lets his eyelids fall shut. It’s probably the first time that he’s so much as blinked since she’s slipped out of her dress. “This is real. You’re really here.”

She laughs again and wraps an arm around him, resting her palm against his back, and pulls him closer so that her bare chest is pressed up against his, taking pleasure in the way his breath hitches at the contact, letting the hand she has resting on his back slip lower. “Come here, you dork,” she says, and he complies.

Reality, Barry finds, is oh-so-much sweeter than anything he could have ever dreamed.

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted on my [tumblr](http://bisexualiriswest.tumblr.com/), as most of these prompt fills are.


End file.
